Document Type
Other
Rights
Available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike 4.0 International Licence
Disciplines
5.6 POLITICAL SCIENCE
Abstract
Empirical research on deliberative democracy has moved through a series of stages, the most recent of which has entailed the study of real world deliberative mini-publics – small groups of randomly selected citizens, operating according to deliberative principles (including facilitated small-group discussions) and tasked with considering one or a number of important policy, institutional or constitutional reform issues (e.g. Elstub, 2010, 2014; Goodin & Dryzek, 2006). Among the various forms of DMPs citizens’ assemblies are seen as ‘democratically superior’ (Elstub, 2014, p. 172). As Graham Smith (2009) notes ‘[n]o other randomly selected body has been given the level of influence in the political process’ (p. 75).
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1080/00344893.2020.1804441
Recommended Citation
Farrell, D.M., Suiter, J. & Cunningham, K. (2020). When Mini-Publics and Maxi-Publics Coincide: Ireland’s National Debate on Abortion. Presented at the General Conference of the European Consortium for Political Research, Oslo September 2017. doi:10.1080/00344893.2020.1804441